Page:Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, Volume 8 (1807).djvu/22

2 Who would not be astonished to find among Quadrupeds, any Genus with Testicula originating in the Præputium! Yet among Vegetables, Stamine proceeding from the Calyx appear to me equally unnatural. The first ideas which we gain on any subject, whether correct or incorrect, attach with such force, that it is no easy business to dismiss them afterwards: moreover, very few will be at the trouble of examining for themselves, or so unpopular as not to adopt the fashions of the day. For, unfortunately, there are fashions in science, as well as in dress: but the Laws of Nature, founded by Infinite Wisdom, I believe like Truth itself to be immutable, and the Motto which we have lately adopted who belong to this Society, will not allow us to deceive ourselves or others respecting them. By exposing this pretended perigynous insertion indeed, many of the Classes, and some of the Orders in the French arrangement must be given up; but the Genera themselves will come in more conformably to the Natural Affinities, and often as Jussieu himself hints in his Notes. I was anxious to have gone to Paris in the autumn, to have stated this, and many other botanical dubia, with the greated deference to that great man: "Lubuit enum integros adire fontes atque haurire:" but Time flies rapidly unless seized by the forclock, and I know not when I can spare a month again. Till so wished-for an occasion, therefore, presents itself, I must be content with such assistance as I can gain at home. That comet-like genius Correa de Serres, who is now in the perihelion of Paris, long ago told me that Corolla regularis and irregularis would be found in every Natural Family, and I have reason to think the same may be said of Germen inferum and superum. Having examined a great many flowers to verify that supposition, I could not avoid attending also to the insertion of their several parts: this I have constantly found to be in one common point, more or less